Gasoline prices are up almost 80 cents a gallon since January. The national average for regular gas stands at just above $3.80 per gallon.

Pity the drivers on the West Coast. Prices there have been much higher. At a Chevron station in Culver City, Calif., the price on Tuesday was $4.45 a gallon.

"I do building maintenance," Ursula Matthews said as she filled her tank. "I do a lot of driving from place to place. It's hurting me. I cannot raise the prices [of my services] with the economy what it is."

Lindon Dawson, another customer at the same station, wondered, "How long is this going to last? Because this is kind of making me broke."

There's good news for Dawson and his wallet. It looks like gas prices on the West Coast are headed down.

"Wholesale prices for gasoline are trading about 50 cents a gallon lower than they were as recently as Feb. 24," says Tom Kloza, chief oil analyst at the Oil Price Information Service in Wall, N.J.